Wishing all the mothers in the world the honor and recognition that they deserve. Below is a picture of the ultimate in self-sacrificial motherhood--except I don't think these birds have the ethical categories to understand what had actually happened. I took these pictures at Pokagon State Park in 1997.

*****

Last time, as I began this series, I tried to make the point that the understanding of causality, as it emerged in modern (post-Cartesian) philosophy, and as it was implemented by Isaac Newton, was a somewhat truncated one. Essentially, it consisted of "objects" pushing and pulling on each other. No wonder that Hume was skeptical of the empirical perceptibility of such a thing (and just being able to describe it with a mathematical formula does not make it more visible). I think it's telling for Newton's view of the world that he advocated the understanding of light as particles (photons), as opposed to waves, and that, even in the development of his version of the calculus, he visualized the process of leading up to it as the movement of tiny little particles (fluxions) along the line described by a curve.

I suggested that, instead, we need to have a more open, but also more realistic understanding of causality, namely that a cause is an entity that actualizes some potential. I realize that this definition is more vague than "pushing and pulling" by means of forces, but it also does more justice to our actual use of the expression x caused  y:  y was non-existent, but potentially existent. Then x brought y into existence as its cause. This definition includes applications in Newtonian physics, but does not shut the door on other situations.  As I keep saying, I don't think that we ought to try doing metaphysics without doing metaphysics, but if it makes you feel more comfortable, you can stay with the definition that x is a necessary condition and at least is a member of the set of sufficient conditions for y, as long as we don't limit "necessity" to logical entailment, but include factually unavoidable conditions, as based on observation or experience.[1]

I'm still speaking in general philosophical terms. I will explain the following physical phenomena later on, but I really want you to see the difference between a Newtonian understanding of causality and a broader view. Many people are aware that Albert Einstein distanced himself from quantum physics, more specifically the "Copenhagen School" led by Niels Bohr. Did you know that Einstein actually received his Nobel prize, not for either theory of relativity, but for his contribution to quantum mechanics in which he posited light as consisting of particles (good old Newton's photons rediviva)? Subsequently he abjured the newer trends in quantum theory, especially as espoused by Niels Bohr et. al., based on the fact that their theory was incomplete. But, it was incomplete for him, I can say with confidence, because it did not meet Newtonian criteria of causality. In short, and it is really bizarre to say this, When it came to atomic physics, Einstein was Newtonion at heart.

Before giving you the reasons for my claim, let me re-emphasize that the point that I'm trying to make is simply to highlight the difference between coming at certain phenomena with a Newtonian world view or with a broader one. There is no further polemic intended, and I'm not even making any particular truth claims with regard to the physical phenomena at this point

So, now let me try to explain what I mean by Einstein having taken a Newtonian view. I'm going to refer to the phenomenon known as "entanglement," the subject of the book by Amir Aczel that I mentioned last night. "Entanglement" is the physics behind the imaginary idea of the "quantum computer," which plays a significant role in Michael Crichton's Timeline (New York: Ballentine, 2003), as well as my little The Absence of the Bloggist. IBM announced recently that they think they will have a functional quantum computer ready in ten years. We'll see.

The fundamental idea is this: Imagine that you have an electronic gun that shoots out one pair of sub-atomic particles. Because they leave together, they are "entangled" with each other.  Each particle could have certain properties out of a set {{A or B} & {C or D}}. Thus, a particle could have the properties: A & C, A & D, B & C, or B & D.

However, when first emitted, both of these particles will be in the state that is called "superposition," which means that until someone has actually measured the properties of a particle, it acts as though it had all of the available properties, even though they may be mutually exclusive. This is weird stuff, and, as I said, I'll try to describe it better later. For now, we just need to realize that, when we use our particle gun to shoot out a pair of particles, both of them are in the state of superposition; both demonstrate all four subsets of properties. So, now we select particle 1 and measure it. We keep track of its properties and check particle 2. Its properties will immediately show up to be equal and opposite to particle 1.

Clearly, our action of analyzing particle 1 must have released some kind of force that affected particle 2 and communicated to it which properties it should adopt. Well, we can test that: Let us say that we create such a large distance between them that we can rule out any communication by any conceivable force, gravitational, electromagnetic, nuclear, whatever. So we set up our apparatus so that by the time we measure the properties of one particle, the other one is a football field's length away. The same phenomenon still occurs. Once we measure the properties of one electron, the properties of the other electron immediately become its equal and opposite. So, how can the properties of one particle influence the properties of another particle a hundred yards away? That could be a trick question because quantum mechanics, according to Bohr's interpretation, allowed for no "influence." It is just the nature of particles to come out that way. If one is A, the other is B. If one has a clockwise spin, the other one's spin is counterclockwise. Even though neither one had either property prior to the measurement (or perhaps both), once you've determined the properties of one, the other one instantaneously must have the opposite properties.

But, seen from a Newtonian point of view, there must have been some way in which, say, particle 1, communicated with particle 2, so that particle 2 could know which properties particle 1 possesses and take on the opposite properties. But no such factor is known.

I've been writing about this phenomenon as though it were based on experimental observation. Actually, that's not how it first came up. (See Aczel, Entanglement, pp. 111-121). Albert Einstein brought it up in an article published in 1934 (co-authored with Nathan Rosen and Boris Podolsky) as a thought experiment involving quite complex and apparently flawless mathematics on how the wave functions of the two particles would become entangled at the outset prior to observations. He proposed that, if the Copenhagen version of quantum mechanics were true, then entanglement would be a definite result. However, entanglement is not physically possible because it would involve what he called "a spooky action at a distance," which is to say a causal influence of one particle on another particle without any physical force between the two particles. This was clearly impossible, and so Einstein, along with some other notable physicists, wound up parting theoretical ways with the main stream of quantum mechanics. 

The big names in quantum physics, Werner Heisenberg, Erwin Schroedinger, Wolfgang Pauli, and others were furious at Einstein--probably more at the fact that he wrote against their theory than at what he wrote--though they couldn't really refute it. Niels Bohr went into a tizzy trying to find a way to prove Einstein false, but struggled helplessly. He eventually announced that the article was irrelevant since it had no experimental application.

Since then the entanglement phenomenon has been confirmed at distances of many miles. Einstein was vindicated by the claim that entanglement was, indeed, a consequence of quantum mechanics, but quantum mechanics was vindicated because what Einstein thought of as a reductio ad absurdum turned out to be physically real.

You see, when it came to science, Einstein was a materialistic determinist. Notwithstanding occasional references to God, his theology was a deistic one at best: God was the creator who started the clock running. Now, I'm not saying that this world view is worse than the agnosticism and skepticism expressed by many of his colleagues, but we need to realize that such was his approach, and that it figured in his response to later quantum mechanics.

And then we need to make sure that we don't buy into the same paradigm. Objects and the forces associated with them pushing and pulling at each other just don't exhaust all that happens in the universe.

I'm reminded of an argument made by Kai Nielsen, a leading atheist of the previous generation. I guess he should be considered an "old" atheist. His over-all case didn't hold in the final analysis, but, in contrast to the so-called new atheists, he was a rigorous philosopher who presented real arguments with which one could actually interact. Nielsen (Introduction to Philosophy of Religion, New York: St. Martin's, 1982, pp. 17-42), following the canons of analytic philosophy, tried to show that the concept of God is not meaningful. His basic argument was that God is described as both incorporeal and as acting in the world. But how can a non-corporeal being possibly carry out actions in the material world? According to Nielsen, the only experience of action that human being have is that of one material being acting ("pushing or pulling") on another material being. Actions by a non-corporeal being on material objects is beyond our experience and are, therefore, incomprehensible. But, since the concept of God is intimately tied to his acting in the world, the concept of God is also intrinsically incoherent.

A response to Nielsen on this point is fairly easy and straightforward. His idea of the unintelligibility of actions by an immaterial being, to which he appeals, is obviously gratuitous. Millions of people seem to find it comprehensible, for example when they pray, so such an argument based on the meaningfulness of words includes some highly dubious assumptions.

Now, I'm certainly not saying that quantum mechanics proposes divine action to explain matters such as entanglement. But it challenges us to back off from a naive materialistic and deterministic understanding of the world.

Next time: So, what is a quantum anyway?

*****

[1] In other words, we limit ourselves to alpha, the actual world. Neither logically possible worlds in which the laws of the universe are different from the ones we know, nor so-called alternative universes fit into this definition.

First of all, an announcement: Today I mailed out the new volume of the Journal of the International Society of Apologetics. Please note: I only sent it out to dues-paid members. If you have any questions concerning your status, please make contact with ks-removethispart-weis@ccc.edu., our secretary-treasurer. Also, I ran out of time, and hopefully tomorrow will be able to send it to a few people that I didn't get to today, viz. non-US members and the authors of articles, who get extra copies.

*****

Here follow some thoughts that are connected in my mind, though the connection won't be discernible to too many people. Then a chip from the floor of my workshop, and finally some beginning thoughts on the relationship of Christian thought to modern physics.

*****

So, the Tippy Ditch Singers have played Converse, Indiana. For me, the night was snake-bit, first with my bass's connector to the pick-up chord coming apart, just in time for our first number. I managed to fix it afterwards. Then there was the lack of a regular guitar for our last song when only Jim and I were left, and just a bass by itself doesn't work too well. The back-up group somehow couldn't get me into the correct key. Quite embarrassing, and I really felt sorry for Jim. After asking several times to borrow someone's guitar, one gentleman let me use his. I thanked him profusely. One chord, and I was into the key and took off, letting the song become a kind of catharsis after that frustration.  "Why me Lord?" may never have been performed anywhere with as many gratuitous jazzy notes thrown in and with as much passion. With all due appreciation for his song and his performances of it, I'm including Kris K. in that assessment, just this once.-- One obvious thing I learned is: Always take a regular guitar or banjo along.

*****

Chips from the Workshop: Among the Australian Aboriginal tribes, there is a pervasive duty to share what you have received, and this is a commandment that usually goes back directly to their supreme being. A. W. Howitt (The Native Tribes of Southeast Australia) mentioned this point particularly with regard to the Guain and the Kamilaroys, but it is true of almost all tribes. This does not mean that all property in a clan is communal, but that, if someone is successful in a hunt, for example, he is morally obligated to share the meat with those who were unsuccessful or unable to hunt. If you were a member of the tribe and found a large lizard, you could not just eat it alone; you would have to divide your bounty with others. At the time of first contact with Europeans, they were practicing this duty faithfully.

In fact, when Howitt observed the Gunai initiation ceremony, the elders added one ritual to the ceremony, a very rare thing in a traditional culture. They felt that it was necessary due to the fact that the young candidates had been in contact with a few white people. The headman went from boy to boy and with a symbolic gesture pulled something out of their chest. The thing that he removed symbolically, as it were, was the greed that they might have picked up from European-originated people.

Consistent readers of my blog know that I keep insisting that true Christianity stands out from other religions because so many Christians do serve selflessly, not just other Christians, but also people who do not believe as they do. And, I'm sure, some of the Christian missionaries to Australia in the nineteenth century displayed that attitude. However, I also think that this mind-set was hardly displayed by the colonizers.

Just another little chip that I didn't want to sweep away immediately.

*****

 I've been continuing to work on my math, and I've now figured out that the derivative of a line described by y = 3x² is 6x, and that the integral of y = x³  is x⁴/4. So, I've made some progress, I hope.  Furthermore, my friend Bill H. just sent me a link to a good article on an ongoing debate between scientists and philosophers concerning the limits of science; so, it appears that discussions on the nature of science are in the wind. Thus, it may be about time to start the promised series on a Christian view of the world and the remarkable ideas of modern physics. The two immediate causes for these ruminations are 1) a question asked of me by a wonderful Christian brother in Germany, and 2) coming across some material written by certain Christian apologists that showed a bit of confusion on the basic principles of quantum mechanics and, consequently provided some conspicuously inadequate responses. I haven't decided yet exactly what to call this series or made up a logo for it yet. 

I promise you this: By the end of this series, you will not be able to solve Schroedinger's equation, unless you picked it up from somewhere else. But I also promise you another thing: By the end of this series you will understand the basic principles underlying quantum mechanics and relativity. Well, that is to say, if you read it.

God created the world. God did not create science. Science is a human attempt to understand the world that God created. Science discovers the laws of nature. Did God create the laws of nature? No, not in a straightforward sense. The "laws" are also human efforts of making sense of God's world. However, God created the world to which these laws apply, and the better our description of this world is, the closer we get to the nature of the world God has created. So, how good are our descriptions, and how close are we to understanding God's creation?

Apparently towards the end of the nineteenth century a popular opinion held that physics was basically done. Isaac Newton had laid down the ground rules, and, except for a few little matters, there was not much left to discover. If one wanted to explore new territory, one should probably go into another field other than physics.  That sentiment seems so weird now, but it was real, among physicists as well as non-scientists. They were wrong. The world that God has created has turned out to be far more complex and interesting than Newtonian physics could possibly describe.

Let me tell you one reason why Newton's physics could not possibly be as self-contained as people thought. It was tied to some really bad philosophy. Towards the very end of the Middle Ages, philosophy went into a tailspin. The nominalists, leading off with William of Occam, led Western philosophy into a time of skepticism, and when philosophy reemerged, it was exceedingly primitive, showing none of the sophistication one had found in Aquinas, Scotus, or Bonaventure. Unfortunately, the naive concepts of modern philosophy (from the 17th century on) have stayed with us, and for many people they have become common sense, so that they immediately read these ideas into statements about the world. To return to the thought expressed above, God created the world, but he did not created the Newtonian world.

Now, here's my first major point. The usual statement in textbooks is that we really don't have to worry about quantum mechanics or relativity. On the level of our normal lives, they say, we can safely stick with a Newtonian conception of reality. This is poppycock. I don't know whether we need to get worried about quantum physics or Einstein, but the Newtonian view of the world is definitely inadequate, even on an everyday level--always has been and always will be. Let me illustrate what I'm trying to get at by citing from Amir D. Aczel, Entanglement: The Greatest Mystery of Physics (New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 2001), p. 12:

I enjoy Dr. Aczel's books, including this one, and, for what it's worth, I highly recommend his Fermat's Last Theorem. Still, the assertion that Newton gave the world the concept of causality is a little overstated, but it's an assertion that has more truth to it that one may think at first. Obviously, other people, including philosophers and scientists had a concept of causality prior to Newton. But what Newton gave the world, or at least reinforced with his laws, was a particular notion of causality, one that was significantly narrower than it should have been. Newton's causality is purely one of pushing and pulling. In order for there to be causal interaction between two objects, they have to be in close enough contact with each other so that they can exercise force on each other, and that means either pulling or pushing. Apply a few measurements, and we can express the relationship between two objects by filling in the parameters of the appropriate formula.

My point is this: True enough, pushing and pulling, or the interaction of forces, such as gravity or electromagnetic attraction and repulsion, are instances of causality. But where we go wrong is if we limit causality to just that expression. Causality is broader than that. It is the actualization of a potential. I can cause my wife to smile by doing or saying certain things, and I beg you to please not interpret such an instance along the line of molecular interactions. Even if you could do so, it would be ludicrous to say that such things on an atomic level are what was really going on. That would be a goofy view of reality, one that we certainly don't live by. Or, when we say that the downturn in the economy caused a lot of unemployment, there's no pushing and pulling between objects going on.

So, as we begin to look at some things that don't seem to fit our everyday thinking about the world, a good way to start making sense of some strange phenomena is to realize that some of the concepts with which we approach the world may be too limited. That's not going to make all the strange stuff make perfect sense; it doesn't dissolve the paradoxes engendered by relativity or give us certainty where Heisenberg was uncertain. However, it should help us focus on the issues rather than on unnecessary limits that we place on ourselves by using concepts that are too restrictive. We'll get to those things as we move along and look at them more closely, but we can't look at them at all if we don't allow ourselves to break out of limits that we have set ourselves by tradition.

God caused the world to exist. God caused the world to contain entities that are themselves causes, producing further effects. God caused the world to contain effects that go beyond a Newtonian understanding of causality.

And were off . . .

*****

[1]  I'm not entirely sure what Aczel means by a "massive body." Perhaps he means to stress that a body has mass, which strikes me as redundant. Speaking of redundancy, some of us may remember, if we took a course in physics, that force and velocity are vectors, and thus have a direction intrinsically. I'm not quibbling so much as trying to show up front that I'm not just stringing together undigested pieces of information.

Come break up your week tomorrow night! The Tippy Ditch Trio will be a part of the musical festivities in Converse Indiana. Apparently they have a musical amateur open-mike type of event every Wednesday evening, starting with a dinner at 5:30. Who are "they"? I don't rightly know. Converse is about twenty minutes West of Marion. I don't know the name of the actual venue yet, but, given the size of Converse, the first friendly Hoosier you see in the small town should be able to give you the relevant information. We'll be among a number of other groups performing.

So, last Friday night I wasn't feeling well enough for rehearsal, and I haven't really felt too good for a number of days, but we practiced tonight, and it went really well, and, as music usually does for me, I started to feel a lot better. Considering the fact that there are five members in the trio, and that who can make it at any given rehearsal or for a particular performance keeps varying, we're actually starting to jell pretty well.

Chips from the Workshop. Not that long ago, I made reference to E. B. Tylor's theory of language development, supposedly based on the observations by field anthropologists of tribal people, and I raised some concerns about his data and conclusions. I ran across a beautiful quote by Wilhelm Schmidt addressing the correct response, which Tylor could not yet have articulated fifty years earlier idea when he did not have all of the data to which Schmidt had access. I don't know whether this book has ever been translated into English: The Families and Spheres of the Languages of the Earth (Die Sprachfamilien und Sprachenkreise der Erde (Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1926)). In his introduction, Schmidt wrote:

Today it is a matter of fact beyond all doubt that even the lowest populations of humanity possess an actual complete language. The discovery by the imaginative researcher E. Häckel, namely Homo alalus ("man without speech"), who in his day was still supposed to be coursing through the dark jungles of Africa, South America, and Australia, has been consigned with finality to that well-stocked museum containing all of those curiosities with which evolutionism has enriched the history of science so generously. The same tragic fate has beset all of those tribes who were supposed to have had such a deficiency in language that they could only communicate by daylight, because only then would they be able to see the gestures and grimaces without which they would not be able to comprehend their wretched language. The genuine exact science of language has now penetrated so far into all areas of the earth that it can confidently establish the principle that nowhere on earth are there people without any speech or with only half a language. They might be speechless temporarily, but then just out of amazement and outrage if they heard of the fiction that evolutionism in its full bloom had created for them. (p. 4; my translation)

I had already made the comment at the time of the entry that it struck me as odd that  the languages on which Tylor relied, such as Yoruba and Zulu, were unquestionably fully developed complex languages. By the way, Schmidt's knowledge of languages and his facility in learning them was one of the several areas that put him way above his peers in the various debates concerning original religion once he got involved in them.

As I continue to share with you some of these "chips from a German workshop" (Max Müller's term), where I mention some things that come up as sidelight in the process of writing the manuscript on original monotheism, let me clarify a couple of important points since I assume that many readers are anticipating the conclusion. First of all, I can only develop the actual argument in the book, as the total case has to consider a lot of interrelated information, and as I don't want to get into trouble with the publisher for giving away everything. But second, for anyone already mentally trying to come up with what he or she may consider to be counter arguments to the expected case: The fundamental argument is not based on the idea that every culture somehow includes a concept of a high god. Such an assertion would neither be defensible nor, even if it were true, would it add up to a case of original monotheism any more than Tylor's assessment that all people practice some form of spirit veneration, definitely not true, would have entailed the conclusion that religion began with animism. So, if you're attempting to compile a list of cultures, traditions, and religions without the idea of a supreme being, such list will in the end only contribute to my case.

One other quick matter before hanging it up for tonight. Coming soon:

Who would have thought, after all these years? I know you would have, but who else? Okay, B-H obviously did and so did the Spanish publisher, but still . . . Now, I wonder if I can still get them to fix my first name on the cover? And, of course, the title still overreaches somewhat. For anyone who in the past has made a big deal out of that or will revive the matter, I was not given the opportunity to approve of the title, No Doubt About It, not even to sign off on it. But rational people without intending to grind an obviously poorly mounted ax, see the intent behind the somewhat overstated title. All they have to do is to read the back page. (Another myth about scholarship in the twenty-first century: Even though you may feel that in order to do justice to a book in a book review you should study it carefully, many of our colleagues do not. They seek to identify the basic position of an author, decide to what extent it fits into their own belief system, find a few supportive quotes to either praise or pan the book, and off it goes. --- Not on John Wilsey's and my watch, though. :)

A few items of a personal nature. June finally has health insurance. After my COBRA ran out, I had to wait six months to be eligible for Medicare. Really. That's the rule. If you have to be on disability, you have to go half a year without any insurance before you can get Medicare. If you're eligible for COBRA, you have to use up all your eligibility (at over a thousand dollars a month), and then go for six months without insurance. The same requirement applies to state medical help programs. My six months just happened to coincide with my emergency back surgery, and it obviously contributed significantly to our bankruptcy about a year ago. Well, I eventually got Medicare, but June, who had always been on my insurance, wasn't included. Furthermore, due to her having had breast cancer five years ago, she was unable to get any coverage--other than fraudulent stuff--anywhere. That meant going for several years without the regular mammogram check-ups she was supposed to get, but it's just not possible for a normal person to pay for medical testing. Leo, my social worker, finally directed her to the state mammogram program, and a little while ago she found out that there's now a federally sponsored "pre-existent condition" insurance. It costs a fortune in premiums and has a gigantic deductible, and it won't do a whole lot unless there is a significant problem. But it's real insurance with real coverage for medical services, not just one of those useless "$100/day-if-you're-in-the-hospital"plans.

So, she's had a mammogram, and, unfortunately that one called for another mammogram and ultrasound, and that one is about to lead to another mammogram and possibly a biopsy. There's some kind of mass, located on the other side from last time. The present account is that it does not look malignant, but neither does it look like purely routine cysts. In other words, we don't know what it is, but we're not supposed to be alarmed about it.  Prayers appreciated.

By the way, for the moment, that scenario may curtail extensive travel intentions for the summer.

*****

Looking at a brighter side, it's been a beautiful day, and I made us Tendori chicken earlier.

*****

Now for some chips from the workshop: In many ways this is a good thing, I guess, but I'm continuing to be really absorbed by the anthropology of religion of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.

I first heard about original monotheism from the Catholic religion teacher, a priest, at Gymnasium (German upper level school). In those days they still taught Christianity in religion classes. Our Protestant teacher taught us from the Bible, following a basic Lutheran/Barthian point of view, with occasionally allowing for the fact that there was a Reformed option on some points. It was pretty insipid, and I have to confess that I didn't learn a whole lot. The Catholic students were taught pre-Vatican II Catholicism. One day the Protestant teacher was absent, and we Protestants and Catholics had the hour together. This must have been prior to my time in Bavaria because I remember how wary I was about what a Catholic priest could possibly tell us. I don't remember everything he said, but I remember that he began by telling us that there had been explorers who had stayed with far-away tribes for long periods of time without ever learning about what the people really believed. Finally, once they had gained native people's trust and confidence, they might then tell their guests in great secrecy about their supreme god. They would disclose that they believed that there was one God who created the world, who was all-knowing and all-powerful, and that they only worshiped him at special times. I remember wishing after the class period that we could have religion class with the Catholic priest more often because he had a lot of good content to convey to us.

That's where my fascination with original monotheism began. At that point in time, it had just been a few years since P. Wilhelm Schmidt had passed away. I learned about him later, and it took an even longer time to understand how much of a role Andrew Lang had played. But Lang also had to rely on the reports of other scholars. ---[Please note that the books referred to below are all based on articles that had been published and debated earlier--sometimes by decades.]

By the time he published The Making of Religion (1898), Andrew Lang had compiled sufficient evidence that should have induced the animistic school of E. B. Tylor to rethink matters. Lang had made a pretty incontrovertible case that many of the least developed tribal cultures of Australia practiced neither animism nor ancestor worship, but acknowledged the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, all-good, though anthropomorphized, Creator. Nevertheless, many of his opponents simply ignored the evidence. Tylor had already decreed several years earlier that any signs of monotheism in tribal cultures were due to Christian missionaries ("The Limits of the Savage Mind," 1892), and that settled the question for any number of people, even when the possibility of such an influence was ruled out by evidence. Actually, Christian missionaries had a very difficult time getting any Aboriginals to listen to their message, but some of them, as well as some anthropologists, became thoroughly acquainted with the local cultures, learning their language and mythology, and a few even were present at some of the secret initiation ceremonies from which women, children, and non-initiated men were barred on pain of death.

So, there were these two anthropologists, Baldwin Spencer and F. J. Gillen  [The Native Tribes of Central Australia (London: 1899), and The Northern Tribes of Central Australia  (London: 1904)] who visited a tribe whom they called the Uranta and others called Aranda; nowadays these people are referred to as the Arrernte. They came away with the news that, as far as they could tell, this was a tribe of atheists with no religion. Spencer and Gillen learned about a spooky and cartoonish bogey-man-like being, Twanyirika by name, but he was not really a god or a divine spirit, just a being who liked to play tricks on people and punish wayward children. Many of the adult men to whom Spencer and Gillen talked did not take him seriously at all. Nor did the two investigators find a meaningful code of ethics among the members of the tribe. Their conclusion became widely accepted; it fit in pretty nicely with the presumption that these people, who were on a rather low stage in terms of material culture, also had to be on a totally pre-developed level of religion. The Uranta seemed to them to be about as religion-less as any people could get. Spencer and Gillen just did not realize how secretive these people were about their religion. Their real understanding of the supreme being was far too sacred to reveal to some nosey "white-fellas."

Just a few thoughts, though this hasn't been a day for a lot of thinking. It's been a couple of not-so-easy days physically. Intellectually, I've been continuing to burrow through Tylor, Lang, Huxley, Howitt, Schmidt, Spengler and Spencer, and the various ethnologists, philologists, anthropologists, folklorists, and Australologists. With every paragraph I write, something needs checking, and then, when I find what I needed to see, I run across  another thing that I feel compelled to trace down and learn about. I love it! And the thing is, it's all there! I mean, if you've not availed yourself lately of how much the number of e-prints on the web has grown, you're in for an incredible surprise. It seems as though there isn't much, no matter how obscure,  that isn't available.  Between all the imaging websites and archives, it's unbelievable how many books copyrighted, say, 1893, I've looked at or downloaded over the last week or so. This is research heaven. Don't give up, even if "Google Books" says, "No digital version available," or words to that effect. There are so many books going into the public domain these days, someone is bound to be scanning the very one you're looking for right now. (I'm glad we're no longer dependent on libraries that routinely clear "outdated" books off their shelves.)

This research-and-writing can also get a little whacky. I've been feeling as though this entire late-nineteenth, early-twentieth-century discussion is a contemporary debate. Those aforementioned gentlemen certainly mastered the art of sarcasm and concealed invective, and I haven't even gotten to Pettazoni and Durkheim.  Even though I'm obviously partisan in the discussion to an extent, and I do know the outcome, it's still not easy to keep emotionally aloof. And I have to be sure that I maintain objectivity. If I overlook that some point with which I resonate has clearly been refuted a long time ago, the purpose of the book will be lost.

There's a very common, but potentially extremely misleading, way in which people often appeal to scholarship these days. I find it in any number or contexts, and some Christian apologists seem to make use of it at times as well, which certainly doesn't help anyone in the long run. There are few interesting, or even uninteresting, topics on which there isn't a pile of articles and books. The publish-or-perish policy at various institutions certainly hasn't helped any. --Here's a terrible idea: If someone's articles weren't good enough to get him or her tenure, shouldn't they be purged from the journals and thereby help reduce the surplus publications, as Scrooge would say? Well, I guess not. -- Anyway, it's all-too-easy for someone who is not well-versed in a particular field to look through the mass of literature, find the one or two articles that look like they support their point of view, hold them up and say, "Look! Here's scholarly support for my position!" That kind of "research" can make one look really silly when it turns out that the articles in question were written by crackpots. So, eternal vigilance is the price of academic as well as civic freedom, I guess.

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It's been bothering me for a while that the links to my various discussions of the past are pretty well hidden in that crowded-looking column on the right, so I spent a little time today organizing my various consolidations of the past--the series, essay, harangues, travelogues, and what-nots. I'm letting this chart be the blog entry tonight and then it'll become a page of its own with a clear link to it from the masthead or from some other obvious and visible locations. I don't know yet what I'm going to do with that confusing column.

With regard to those resources, let me reiterate something that I've said from time to time. I don't consider my stuff public domain, but I definitely want it to be publicly usable. I'm thinking particularly of the travelogues, which contain a lot of descriptions that are hard to put into a publishable  book these days (as opposed to, say, in 1893), since they are more easily narrated, not to mention that the pictures are far better displayed on the web than in print. So please, educators or Christian workers or anyone else of good will and intent, please make use of anything I have posted there. Just put my name or the relevant URL somewhere in its vicinity, if you would, please. Students, thank you for always following the proper method of crediting sources that your teacher or school expects from you.

The listing in the chart below is sort of alphabetical by main subject, though it may take you a bit to figure out what term I was thinking of for some of them.

I'm still working on my algebra, and  once I got that down, I'll be starting a new series on quantum physics and relativity, hopefully relatively soon.  In the meantime, if 2x=4, then 4x=2, right?---No?---Oh dear! I'll have to study some more. Fortunately, reworking some of those matters is providing a good balance to the never-ending squabbles over the marriage arrangements among South East Australian tribes.

WEBSITES AND TOPICS

More shavings picked up from the floor as I'm continuing to work on the book about original monotheism.

Most of the above is true. Andrew Lang (1844-1912) was a man of controversy. He is credited with single-handedly establishing the ascendancy of evolutionary anthropology over philology, as represented by Max Müller, who was its ablest representative. He certainly spared no effort in lambasting Müller, and I can't say that he always completely understood his method or represented him fairly. Understanding Müller is admittedly not easy. His focus was on the language of myths, not their content. So when Müller resorted to Indian literature, it was not in order to find parallels between Hindu myths and Greek myths, but to establish the etymology of the names of characters in Greek mythology. Since he believed that Sanskrit was a lot closer to proto-IE than other languages, he frequently used Sanskrit in the process of finding derivations. He never said anything as absurd as that Greek was derived from Sanskrit, or that Greek mythology and Indian mythology were related, except for what may have been shared on the most elementary level by the hypothetical proto-IE-speaking tribes. I must also add that I find a number of Müller's derivations, though not his overall history of language, fairly convincing, whereas my toes start curling when I read the nonsense produced by a number of his German colleagues. Regardless, there were times when Lang got carried away in his rhetoric and did not observe the crucial distinctions established by Müller.

Lang never met a controversy he did not like, and he pursued each one personally and passionately. He studied in Oxford under E. B. Tylor and became one his most ardent and vociferous disciples. After obtaining his degree, he remained as a [teaching] fellow there for seven years, at which point he got married, left Oxford, and began a successful career as writer. I won't get into the specifics of his theories on religion here; they were continuously in process, and trying to explain them is a part of what I'm attempting to do in the book. Even though he remained deferential and positive about Tylor, he effectively broke with him on publishing The Making of Religion. The idea that some of the materially least developed people on the globe had a belief in a God akin to the God of the Bible and a high standard of morality was incompatible with Tylor's theory of animism, not to mention with those of virtually anyone else.

Thus, it is not surprising that reactions to Lang's Making of Religion  were defensive and ad hominem, insofar as he was not simply being ignored, nothing like the conclusion of our fairy tale above. But that's how the academy works; people don't often reverse their position immediately on the basis of new evidence. I don't think that it's an accident that by this time Lang had been away from the university for quite a while and could challenge the dogmas dictated by the dons without endangering his career. To that extent this discussion is no different from so many others over the centuries.

However, what strikes me in particular in this context is the certitude with which the established experts pronounced on the status of the Australian Aborigines prior to definitive data being collected and thorough studies being undertaken. Tylor had already consigned all pre-literate people to animism, and disconnected whatever ethics these people may have had to tribal conventions. "But these ethical laws stand on their own ground of tradition and public opinion, comparatively independent of the animistic belief and rites which exist beside them." (Primitive Culture, vol. 2, 2nd. ed., p. 260). Having made up his mind and declared this position, he side-stepped any further discussion. "It has seemed to be desirable to keep the discussion of animism, as far as might be, separate from that of ethics." (Ibid.). Not a bad idea since he had no answers.

Neither did T. H. Huxley. You remember Huxley, right? Was he popularly known a) as "Darwin's Bulldog; b) for coining the term agnosticism; c) for his contributions the study of invertebrate zoology; d) as a leader in the study of anatomy in his time; e) as the author of Brave New World;  f) all of the above? Well, you can rule out option f). It was Aldous Huxley, a generation later, who wrote that dreary novel, so there goes option e) as well. I don't know if, taking the term "popular" fairly literally, too many people nowadays are acquainted with his biological work, so c) and d) apply to him, but are probably not the answer to the question. However, a) and b) are undoubtedly the two items most closely associated with him. He was a staunch and loud defender of Darwin and the theory of evolution, and he invented the term "agnosticism" to describe his religious orientation. Of course, you cannot be an agnostic by conviction without being self-referentially incoherent, so he was in reality an atheist. He was a truly knowledgeable man in many fields, and most of his competencies derived from teaching himself the subject matter. However, as much as I admire self-educating oneself to the point of being almost an expert in the field, there is a strong risk of not acknowledging  when one has overstepped the bounds of the field. So, without considering the accounts provided by reliable anthropologists from Australia, Huxley stated:

In it simplest condition, such as may be met with among the Australian savages, theology is a mere belief in the existence, powers, and disposition (usually malignant) of ghostlike entities who may be propitiated or scared away. And, in this stage, theology is wholly independent of ethics. The moral code, such as is implied by public opinion, derives no sanction from the theological dogmas, and the influence of the spirits is supposed to be exerted out of mere caprice and malice. [Science and Hebrew Tradition (New York: Appleton, 1896), pp. 346-47].

Lang responded in his usual diplomatic way: "Remarks more crudely in defiance of known facts could not be made" (Making, p. 174), and he was right. Furthermore, Huxley had the same sources available to him as Lang, and he was supposed to have done some intensive study of Australian culture at some point. So, why would he ignore the facts, or, worse yet, suppress them?

After Lang had shown his evidence for the monotheism in Australia, he stated, "From all this evidence it does not appear how non-polytheistic, non-monarchical, non-Manes [ancestor ghosts]-worshipping savages evolved the idea of a relatively supreme, moral, and benevolent Creator, unborn, undying, watching men's lives." (Making, p. 180)  It cannot, and it takes willfulness and pride not to accept that point. --- That is, of course, once you have seen the evidence, to which you may not have access at the moment. But it is far better to humbly or grudgingly accept your ignorance on a certain point than to make up an untruth that fits into your conceptual framework.

I'm living right now with E. B. Tylor's Primitive Culture (2 vols., 2nd ed., 1889) and Anthropology (2 vols., 1881). It's the third time around with that material as I'm getting close to done with my chapter concerning him in the manuscript on Original Monotheism. Tylor was a unique person. He never finished a basic course of university studies, but started lecturing in Oxford shortly after he was put in charge of a museum on campus, and eventually he became its first Professor of Anthropology. He went on to receive all of the honors available for a British scholar, including membership in the Royal Society, delivery of the Gifford lectures, and so forth. Of all the various advocates of a Darwinian-style evolution of religion, his ideas were probably most widely accepted, and I can think of two reasons for that success: 1) He supported his claims with an overwhelming amount of data (whose quality is a different matter), and 2) his theory was broad enough that it could easily accommodate or be accommodated to the notions of other relatively like-minded scholars. For example, Herbert Spencer believed that religion began with the fear of ancestor ghosts, and John H. King alleged that religion began with an impersonal force called mana. So, Tylor's thesis that animism, the belief in the all-pervasive presence of spirits, was at the origin of religion could easily be modified and, with small alterations, lead to the same pyramid rising from the supposedly most primitive form to the allegedly highest stages of religion.

So, let me gather up some chips from the floor of my German workshop once again (crediting Max Müller for the phrase as always) and mention some of the items that won't get into the book. For example, there's his theory on the development of language. Tylor did not disdain philology or linguistics, but it was obviously not his specialty, and he had reservations about its limitations. As a self-educated gentleman, he was, of course, well versed in Latin, Greek, and French, but, as appreciative as he was of his colleague, Max Müller, his Sanskrit appears to be second-hand, as were all of his multitudinous references to expressions from various languages around the globe. A part of his working theory was that language specialists had tied themselves too closely to specific language families, and that the patterns he was advocating could be more easily substantiated by an unrestricted world-wide collection of verbal specimens. Neither space nor time were a barrier to what he included among his examples. In fact, if he found what he considered to be homologies widely separated in geographical and chronological distance, he would consider such a phenomenon to be a boost for his claims.

In conformity with so-called conventional wisdom, Tylor's evolutionary anthropology included the idea of the slow emergence of language among human beings. His views were strongly influenced by those of Wilhelm von Humboldt, though he was far removed from the latter's capability in analyzing languages. He held that human beings first expressed themselves by vocalizing their emotions and by imitating the sounds of animals around them. These forms of communication were preceded by gestures and pointing, and even when language became audible, it was accompanied by various actions and postures to clarify the intent. As languages spread and diversified, they became self-restricting, in the sense that no single language made use of all possible sounds of which the human voice is theoretically capable.  

Now, we need to realize that, in keeping with his attempt at providing as much evidence as possible, the language studies on which he relied included Yoruba, Zulu, Mohawk, Pima, and many others--all of which are well-developed, highly complex languages. He even made use of Chinook jargon, not the aboriginal language of the Chinook nation of the Pacific Northwest, but a pidgin language forged out of a combination of actual Chinook, English, and artificially created terms. In short, Tylor's method of accumulating global evidence was anything but empirical. He scoured the four corners of the earth to find support for his theories, oftentimes yanking what he looked for out of its context. So, his descriptions of "simple" languages was based on studies of languages that were anything but simple, but from within which he then tried to identify the "primitive" kernel--without any strong competence in linguistics or philology, let alone the languages themselves.

First of all, then, according to Tylor, the earliest vocalizations expressed emotions. He assumed a "universal gesture languages" (Prim. Cult., 1, 165) that clarified the emotions and could be understood by all people. Furthermore, supposedly early, and thus presumably original, sounds, such as "Ow!" pretty much speak for themselves, as it were. We must note, though, that, contrary to Tylor's supposition, there is some serious question as to whether it is really possible to identify universally applicable sounds, gestures, or other means of expressions. To put it simply, a smile can mean very different things from culture to culture, or if I say "oh" as I am traveling in different parts of the world, I may convey radically different impressions.

Second, Tylor wrote that in constructing their language, human beings resorted to imitating animal sounds, many of which lent themselves to expressing human emotions, such as the hooting of an owl or the scratching sounds of a raven. They adopted these sounds, but, of course, they had to change them in the process because, after all, as we said above, any one language is limited in the numbers of sounds available to it (Prim. Cult., 1, 201). Thus, such sounds could be masked as they appear in the language today. 

There appears to be a circularity in this second part. We are supposed to be looking at (or speculating about) the very beginning of language-formation, the first meaningful use of sounds, based on the imitation of the sounds of nature. So, it appears to be too early to invoke the limitations on sounds that can be employed by any one  language. The catalogue of usable sounds should still be in the process of accumulation. This restriction only makes sense once a language is in place more completely, at a time when people no longer need to imitate the birds to communicate with each other. Bringing up this constraint at this early stage helps Tylor explain why many of the supposed imitation sounds don't necessarily imitate all that well, but it does not fit into Tylor's own scheme.

As one can see, Tylor's speculations on language fit in nicely with the common stereotype of cavemen uttering "duh" and "ooh" and whatever other sounds a Hollywood scriptwriter may permit them to make. But, to return to a point that I have made several times lately, beyond conjecturing back to the prototypes of the various language families, all of which are highly complex, we just don't have the evidence that true human language began in this fashion. Furthermore, to add a somewhat controversial note to this "chip," it may be that the non-human anthropoids and hominids, who were not our ancestors, communicated in grunts and shrieks, but even for them we have no evidence to that effect, let alone for homo sapiens as far back as we can go. (See Ross and Rana, Who Was Adam?, Navpress, 2005, for further clarifications of this allusion, or look back at my discussions on evolution. )

But I don't want to leave matters entirely on that negative note. What Tylor did contribute was significant, even if it ultimately did not stand up to scrutiny. Still, he collected mountains and mountains of evidence that other people could sift through and criticize if they were so inclined. It became apparent that Tylor's method of placing all of the evidence in a blender so as to watch a universal texture emerge would not work. To move forward, the particular ingredients needed to be sorted out according to time and place. The most important criterion for making sense of the data would ultimately not be to start by finding allegedly universal patterns, which might not mean anything except as reinforcements of one's preconceptions. To the contrary, one must look for what is unique in certain cultures and how to interpret special cultural features as they appear and as they influence other cultures. Then, if general patterns should appear, they would have a context in which their potential meaning could be ascertained. However, to come back to the positive point. I mentioned in an earlier entry that for many people evolutionism or Darwinism had become a self-evident dogma. Tylor held to the doctrine to be sure, but his unceasing quest for detailed evidence created the science of anthropology. Thereby, I believe, he held the wild-eyed biologists-turned-social-engineers in check to a certain extent.

*****

For those who are interested please see the additions I have made to the Sanskrit page.

*****

I'm working towards a series on 20th century physics and a Christian World View--coming as soon as your bloggist has reviewed his algebra sufficiently.

 :

We are on our way home from ISCA. As mentioned yesterday, we decided to break up the trip home, so tonight we're staying in Hannibal, Missouri. You can think of this town as either the home town of Mark Twain, or as the town of Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, Becky Thatcher, and Jim, the supposedly escaped slave. I much prefer the latter perspective. As Mark Twain once said . . . [Actually, the basic rule of thumb is that if someone says that Mark Twain said "such-and-such," chances are that he didn't say it.]

It's been raining off and on, and--as June reminded me--the point was to rest up from the conference, so we didn't do a long touristy thing, but we drove around, and I took a few pictures, some of which you are looking at now. Then we had a great supper at the "Mark Twain Restaurant." They had homemade rootbeer there, and it exceeded in quality any brand name root beer with which I'm familiar. And the Cajun chicken I had was superb.

I've always been a fan of Tom and Huck. But, if I may mention this, my appreciation of them increased when I received a copy of the two books (Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn) in one volume, translated into German, back in my youth at the Gymnasium, probably when I was in either the grade that they called the Quinta or the Quarta, roughly corresponding to sixth or seventh grade, around age eleven or twelve for me. The system was pretty complicated. At the time, you could take a test to enter the Gymnasium at the end of either your fourth or fifth school year. Then you would enter the lowest level class, the Sexta, and from there the grades would count down: Quinta, Quarta, Untertertia, Obertertia, Untersekunda, Obersekunda, Unterprima, Oberprima. If you did well, at the end you received a dipoloma called the Abitur, and you would be eligible for university studies. As a further point of trivia, the school year would begin after the Easter break, and--a very important consideration at the time--the Gymnasium was reserved for boys only, while girls went to the separate but equal school called the Lyceum. We left for America at the beginning of what would have been my Untertertia year.

But I have digressed. One day--it must have been during the Quarta--I was told to go to a certain place on the school grounds after classes where I would be met by some teachers, and we would drive somewhere. Obviously I obeyed, though I had no idea of what this was all about. Given my psychological disposition, I certainly didn't rule out that I might be in major trouble (not that I could recollect having committed anything bad). I knew one of the teachers in the car, my history teacher, and he said something along the line of, "What, Winfried? They're giving you a book despite the 5 you're getting in history?" I was confused in some ways, but not in others. I had no idea what the book thing was about, but Herr Klimek had teased me all along that year that I was going to get a 5 in history because I hadn't remembered some trivial detail at some point. The German grading system was (and I think still is) that a 1 was a superior grade, reserved for a truly outstanding performance in a subject, and a 6 was designated for exceptionably abominable work. 5 was clearly flunking the subject, and thus, I guess a 6 meant flunking it with distinction. Generally, if you got a 5 in two subjects or one 6, you would have to repeat the year. I was pretty sure that the threat of a 5 in history was a joke. Anyway, have I digressed again?

The short of it is that the place we went to was a hall with more available seating than we had in the school building, and the occasion was academic recognition. Along with students from other classes, I was called forward and received a copy of the Mark Twain ensemble, inscribed and officially stamped by the director (principal) of the Gymnasium. A cool moment in retrospect, and I'm sorry if this is bragging. For me it's just recollecting; I know my short-comings too well. Anyway I've always appreciated the fact that, even though it was something of an egghead award, the prize was pretty much as un-egghead as you could get: a fun set of books for a boy of my age (to be honest, then and now) to read.

Actually as I'm sitting here in the town called Hannibal, recalling the gag about getting a 5 in history, I'm beginning to crack up. Hannibal, the Cartheginian general, had always been a favorite of mine.  I remember when we had a student teacher in history for a while, and we were learning about the Punic wars, I brought up how Rome's reaction to Hannibal was ineffective for a while due to the power exercised by the consul representing the populist party in the Senate at the time and his short-sighted policies. Unfortunately, the gentleman seeking to receive his pedagogical accreditation was not much interested in such detailed points of analysis at that moment, and I let it pass, though I was somewhat disappointed at the shallowness of his discourse. No question: I needed that threat of a 5, even as a mutually understood joke, to keep me from becoming a pompous ass. I wish some other folks I know would have had Herr Klimek as history teacher. 

So, June and I think we might want to come back to Hannibal in a little while. Of course, it'll be filled with tourists then, but we can take our time, go on the boat ride and maybe get lost in the cave, like Tom and Becky. Maybe we can plan it as a definite event as a few days set aside if another trip to Kansas should materialize. But there I go again. Somewhere along the line we really need to take a genuine vacation without any tasks attached. Our trips are always enjoyable, and we try to get as much out of them as we can, but they're always linked to conferences, workshops, research and so forth. The trip to Thailand was a pretty heavy working trip. Somehow we need to convince ourselves (hah! make that: convince me) that it's okay to go off and just have fun for a while without needing to rationalize it.--- So, I promise that I'll give it more thought as soon as I'm done with all of my other projects.

Another good ISCA meeting came to an all-too-quick end. Yesterday, obviously my entire focus was on the Sanskrit Marathon. Today we were back to the typical ISCA scenario during the workshop sessions. How many times have June and I sat at conferences of other organizations looking over the available papers being given at a particular time slot, maybe eight or so at one time, and not one of them looked interesting to us, and--frankly, we couldn't imagine how any of them could be interesting to any of them except their thesis advisor, their best friend, and their mother (at least pretending). The ISCA dilemma tends to go in the other direction. During the two workshop sessions, with five or six options each time, three or four of them in each time slot looked intriguing and relevant. For obvious personal reasons we selected the two we did attend, but it could have been the others just easily, and I got the papers for some of the sessions we couldn't go to.

Our first session to attend was with Bill Roach, whom I've mentioned on this blog before, e.g., as co-author with Norm Geisler of Defending Inerrancy.

His topic was the dialectic of Karl Barth's Christology and how it ultimately determined his view on Scripture. He got it just right, clarifying Barth's supposed mediating stance on Christology that created a tertium quid, as they say, though I guess it was really a quatertium quid, a "fourth thing," since it attempted to straddle Chalcedonian orthodoxy, Nestorianism, and Monophysitism (spec. Eutychianism). How can you do such a thing? Well, philosophically you can do so by following the pattern of Hegel, where God and humanity merge on the way to becoming Absolute Spirit. (See my combined lengthy treatment of Hegel at http://www.wincorduan.com/hegel.html or go specifically to the place on that site where I discuss Hegel's view of the incarnation.  --- Actually, while I'm mentioning my websites, if you need a break from theology and the like, and you haven't read my little fictional piece, The Absence of the Bloggist, treat yourself to something different.)

*****

For our second session, we went to hear Trevor Slone, whom I sponsored last year to present a paper as an undergraduate, who now, as a graduate student, presented one chapter out of a book he is writing on evolution and creation. This chapter was on some of the unlikable, but unavoidable consequences of Darwinian evolution. Interestingly, we hadn't communicated about this, but he began by focusing on roughly the same issue I just raised on this blog the other day, viz. that cultural anthropology based on Darwinian principles cannot help but be racist. Trevor continued with several consequences that arise out of the fact that the process of evolution is morally neutral, including, for instance, the idea that rape can be justified on the basis of "survival of the fittest." It was quite a personal, hard-hitting paper, saying some things out loud that people would rather not even think about. -- Trevor was also one of the good people who made my day yesterday by taking being a part of my Sanskrit group.

I promised Trevor some quotes from the nineteenth-century evolutionists that support his point, and I'll state and comment on a somewhat lengthy one right here. This is from the end of the last chapter of Darwin's Descent of Man. (Please note, by the way, that further on Darwin is making use of a Larmarckian theory of the inheritance of acquired traits, which he invoked whenever it became suitable. The supposed opposition between Lamarck and Darwin is a myth)

Both sexes ought to refrain from marriage if they are in any marked degree inferior in body or mind; but such hopes are Utopian and will never be even partially realised until the laws of inheritance are thoroughly known. Everyone does good service, who aids towards this end. When the principles of breeding and inheritance are better understood, we shall not hear ignorant members of our legislature rejecting with scorn a plan for ascertaining whether or not consanguineous marriages are injurious to man. [Emphasis mine.]

Note what Darwin is saying here, if you would. He is, of course, assuming inferiority and superiority between the different human races and among people within the various races. That part goes without saying. Like virtually all of his colleagues, he makes a distinction between "savages" and "civilized" human beings. So, if there are two human beings, one of whom is inferior to the other, they ought not to marry. The earlier stated rationale is that the offspring will tend to the "inferior" side. Now, Darwin laments this idea as only Utopian, but calls on people to advance this end. To whom is he addressing this hope for a ban of marriage between those whom he considers to be incompatible? Surely not just to the hypothetical mismatched couple; he is overtly wishing for a social program here. And the first step in this program is for a government-sponsored test of the effects of consanguinity. In other words, the government ought to sponsor some practical experiments on the empirically verifiable effects of incest. After all, if it can be shown that, say, a brother and sister with highly superior intellect can have offspring without genetic repercussions, such marriages should be encouraged, I assume.Thank God for "ignorant members of the legislature" who rejected it "with scorn." 

There are a lot of people on the web accusing creationists and supporters of intelligent design of misrepresenting Darwin on eugenics because he tempers his advocacy thereof at times with appeals to morality. However, it appears to me that when he calls for government-sponsored programs of genetic experimentations using human beings, the man stands indicted. And it is pretty clear, it would seem to me, what his preferences are when he refers to a ban on supposedly mismatched couples "Utopian." 

Darwin goes on, tottering between his own inclinations and the position advocated by a not-so-close relative, Francis Galton.

Darwin: The advancement of the welfare of mankind is a most intricate problem: all ought to refrain from marriage who cannot avoid abject poverty for their children; for poverty is not only a great evil, but tends to its own increase by leading to recklessness in marriage.

Darwin appears to be inclined to the view that poor people ought not to marry, to put it modestly. But, even in such an understated form, we need to ask, Is this simply an appeal to poor people--who would hardly be reading his book--or does he have a government program in mind, or is he simply musing with no practical application in mind? We don't know what he personally intended on the practical side, but he certainly advocated a specific goal. Eugenics became a powerful idea in Europe and America in the early twentieth century, and it based itself on Darwin's ideas, regardless of whether some people may want to say that he really didn't mean what he said. Carrying on with the quotation:

Darwin reflecting on Galton: On the other hand, as Mr. Galton has remarked, if the prudent avoid marriage, whilst the reckless marry, the inferior members tend to supplant the better members of society. Man, like every other animal, has no doubt advanced to his present high condition through a struggle for existence consequent on his rapid multiplication; and if he is to advance still higher, it is to be feared that he must remain subject to a severe struggle. Otherwise he would sink into indolence, and the more gifted men would not be more successful in the battle of life than the less gifted. Hence our natural rate of increase, though leading to many and obvious evils, must not be greatly diminished by any means. There should be open competition for all men; and the most able should not be prevented by laws or customs from succeeding best and rearing the largest number of offspring.

There you have it, not directly from Darwin but from Darwin referring to Galton's ideas: There should be nothing to stand in the way of superior people to be able to improve the human race--neither laws nor customs. If laws and customs may be ignored, anything is possible: eugenics, bullying, rape, anarchy: all the points Trevor mentioned in his speech. But Darwin himself expresses some hesitancy (I think).

Darwin: Important as the struggle for existence has been and even still is, yet as far as the highest part of man's nature is concerned there are other agencies more important. For the moral qualities are advanced, either directly or indirectly, much more through the effects of habit, the reasoning powers, instruction, religion, than through natural selection; though to this latter agency may be safely attributed the social instincts, which afforded the basis for the development of the moral sense.

Okay, Darwin definitely turns down Galton's heat. But he does not shut his gas down completely either. He is simply saying that other considerations are more important than mere existence, namely superior morality. After all, if the superior people become brutish in their struggle for survival and the moral superiority were lost, there would not be a whole lot gained. However, we should not make the mistake of thinking that, therefore, Darwin is opposing the advancement of the superior people through manipulation of who may have offspring or in the battle for survival. He is just not as radical as Galton.  It is here that his recourse to Lamarck becomes important. To clarify this point a little more; Darwin did not replace Lamarck's theory with the theory of natural selection. Since Darwin had no clue as to how genetics really worked, he frequently used Lamarck-like ideas to explain progress as self-propelled by the organism's own effort. So, here he is saying that there is a combination of methods by which the superior humans can advance themselves: First, natural selection provides the social instinct that brings about the moral sense. Then, by cultivating the moral qualities through habit, reason, education and religion, the superior people will propagate themselves since acquired moral skills are supposedly heritable.

Ben Stein is right. And, even though in the quote of Darwin in the film Expelled, Ben did not include all the phrases in which Darwin expressed squeamishness about his own goals, there is no question of what his goals were. And, I'm sorry, but no matter how much people want to apologize on behalf of Darwin,  a person promoting a perverse idea, regardless of whether he implements it himself or his followers do so, he certainly shares some responsibility in it. Even though it may be possible to excuse the person who expressed an idea to some extent (which is not the same thing as justifying him), ideas, once expressed, are incapable of being excused. If I were to say that it would be a good idea to rob such and such a bank and propose a plan for it, I would share in the responsibility if someone else later implemented the idea for which I provided the blueprint. And, of course, even if Darwin cannot be saddled with any of the repugnant ideas, if Galton is an advocate of Darwinian evolution, the point stands that in the 19th century people were putting into print implications of evolutionism that nowadays people do not want to acknowledge. [There you go, Trevor. I'll send you more.]

*****

There followed the last plenary session.  Dr. Phil Roberts spoke on Milt Romney and Mormonism.  It was a good, interesting, fact-filled speech, similar to the one he gave in 2007 or so. However, it was a little bit anticlimactic. At the time he spoke on the topic last time, nothing was decided yet. On the Democrat side, Senator Clinton was gearing up for a  battle, in which she ultimately lost against Sen. Obama.  On the Republican side Gov. Romney was one of many candidates in the as-yet-undecided pre-primary competition, in which he eventually was overrun by his opponents This time, it appears to be settled that the election will pit the pagan President Obama against the Mormon Gov. Romney, and many of us believe that any problems that a Mormon presidency could cause for evangelical Christians, pale against the quality of moral and political leadership President Obama is manifestly lacking. But it was still an interesting, informative talk and a call for watchfulness.

*****

After giving away back issues of JISCA by the armful and some socializing, we parked the truck at the motel, had a latish lunch at Denny's and hung around here the rest of the afternoon and evening. We will most likely not drive all the way home tomorrow, partly because it's doubtful that I'm up to such a haul again (by my standards), partly also because there is a lot of uncertainty with regard to the weather, considering the fact that Kansas had tornadoes today, and we may be either following or leading the path of the storm.